


here’s to us

by josiebelladonna, xtinamoon (josiebelladonna)



Series: up all night [3]
Category: Anthrax (US Band), Bandom
Genre: Art, Awkward Flirting, Christmas, Christmas Smut, Closet Sex, Drama & Romance, Edgeplay, F/M, Family Fluff, Family Secrets, Floor Sex, Hanging Out, Holidays, Inspired by Art, Joey’s the guy who has no idea what he’s in for, Meet the Family, Meeting the Parents, Older Woman/Younger Man, Oral Sex, Quiet Sex, Romantic Face Punching, Secret Relationship, Sneaking Around, Sneaking Out, Switching, Thanksgiving, The Devil is a Sneaky Bastard, Touching, Ugly Holiday Sweaters, like his character in Pledge Night
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-29
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:35:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 21,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23370283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/josiebelladonna/pseuds/josiebelladonna, https://archiveofourown.org/users/josiebelladonna/pseuds/xtinamoon
Summary: (book three)In the wake of a torrid secondary love affair, Joey and Hannah make a deal to meet each other's parents for Thanksgiving.Two best friends having not met each other's households for as long as they've known each other... what can possibly go wrong?
Relationships: Frank Bello/Original Female Character, Joey Belladonna/Original Female Character, Scott Ian/Original Female Character
Series: up all night [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1662133
Comments: 1





	1. good morning!

**Author's Note:**

> While still keeping up with the indie/local music theme from midnight dancers, I'm delving into my own life events here. I feel every author injects some part of themselves into their writing, but I have to confess there will in fact be some parts here that'll be autobiographical.  
> A couple of years ago, I read Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews, and it was one of those books that lingered with me even after having finished it. I've always liked the idea of writing a lengthy family saga type story like that, or like Wuthering Heights, while giving the narrative that young adult/school feeling to it.  
> Add to this, there's that overreaching theme that Joey and Hannah haven't met each other's parents, even having been best friends since elementary school. I feel like this'll be the longest of the series: dreaming of you and midnight dancers are technically novellas, and this will be a novel.  
> I will say this about being quarantined: it's allowed me to take writing to the next level as well as giving the world some stuff to read. I'd be bored to tears otherwise 😘  
> Also! Seeing as we're all continuing this theme of giving content to untapped fandoms and stuff, one of the Anthrax boys aside from Joey and Frankie will have his moment in the sun here, too 💙
> 
> _“Here's to us, here's to love,  
>  all the times that we fucked up.  
> Here's to you, fill the glass,  
> 'cause the last few days have kicked my ass.  
> So lets give 'em hell,  
> wish everybody well, here's to us, here's to us.”_  
> -“Here’s to Us”, Halestorm

_November 2, 1986_.

Joey rolled over onto his back as the sun streamed through the bedroom window. He let a stray lock of flyaway curly hair fall over the bridge of his nose down to his lips. The warm blankets served as a cocoon of sorts in keeping him warm against the otherwise cold room.

Everything was quiet except for his own heart beat and his own breathing through his nose.

He moved his hand to the side only to feel something warm and soft to the left of him. He let his eyes flutter open to look up at the ceiling overhead, but then he rolled his head over the pillow to find her cuddled next to him. Her rich black hair blanketed part of her round pale face. The skin on her eyelids and the bridge of her nose seemed so smooth and glassy like porcelain. Her soft voluptuous body pressed up against him: it took him a second to realize he had caressed the top of her thigh with his finger tips.

He sighed through his nose as he eyed the round, soft shape of her. So soft and lovely.

The first girl he ever loved. The first girl he ever kissed. The only soul to follow him into the bout of quietness and stillness away from the world.

He wondered what she was dreaming about. Was she dreaming about him? Or was she dreaming about the adventure in Seattle? He raised his gaze to the dream catcher on the wall. She still had it after all this time.

How could he have ever ended up with such a lovely friend. Such a loyal soul who always found her way back to him, or rather, he found his way back to her. He always found his way back to her, his best friend. Such a loyal, artistic soul no less. She let the paint and colors of her spirit spread across a canvas or a bit of glass work. She let the power of his voice guide her, to light her way and let her retreat back into her inner world.

Joey returned his gaze to the ceiling overhead and relished in the silence. This was their new quiet place, the spot in the middle of her bed, or his bed. He still managed to find the new quiet place there in Seattle, and even more times when he was a teenager touring over the entirety of the East Coast. Those late nights had those moments of silence wherein he retreated inside of himself even as the adrenaline still ravaged through his system. He missed the feminine principle that Hannah brought to him, and he missed it all through high school.

He lifted his hand out from underneath the blankets and brushed the lock of hair out from his face. He then reached over to push the hair out of her face. She stirred and groaned in her throat upon the touch of his fingers on her brow.

A smile curled up on her face. Joey shifted onto his side and put his right arm around her. He lingered before her face and pressed his lips onto hers.

"Good morning, my desert rose," he whispered into her mouth.

"Good morning, my little horse," she whispered back to him; she never opened her eyes.

"Horse?" That brought a snicker out of him.

"Yeah. I wanna ride your horse."

"Now?" he asked.

"Now."

He felt her fingers caressing down his waist and down underneath the band of his shors. Her fingers slithered down onto his shaft. He nibbled on his bottom lip and groaned in his throat.

She fondled him with just one hand. It always amazed him that she was able to do it with one hand and one hand only. It could have been from the fact she handled a paint brush with one hand and held a palette with the other, or it could have been from the fact she knew how to tickle him.

He gazed into her placid face, her eyelids still closed to where she resembled a porcelain mask, and breathed harder from the feeling.

"My hand or your mouth?" she whispered to him.

"Your hand or my mouth?" he echoed.

"Your hand or my mouth," she twisted it around and cracked her eyes open for him.

"My hand or your mouth—wait a minute," he sputtered, and she giggled at him.

"By the way—seeing as Thanksgiving is coming up—I'm gonna be going out of town with my parents."

"You're leaving me again?" he whispered.

"No, no," she promised as she shook her head. "We're going to Reno to visit my grandparents, my aunt, and my cousins. It's just gonna be for Thanksgiving weekend and then we'll back come that Sunday."

She gazed up at him from the pillow.

"Unless—you wanna come with," she continued.

"But that means I have to meet your parents, though," he pointed out.

"And you have to tell your parents where you're going, too," she replied.

"Great," he muttered. Hannah stroked his thigh with her other hand.

"We have to at some point, though," she pointed out.

"But that was the best part about our relationship, though," he insisted. "The secrecy behind it. We're hidden away from the world."

"We can always tell your parents that I'm just a new girl in your life," she suggested.

"But that means I have to lie to my mom and dad, though," he pointed out.

"But you're gonna have to do something, though. You're gonna have to do something if you wanna come along. The fact you even brought up the possibility of meeting my parents tells me you want to come along."

Joey sighed through his nose: he could still feel Hannah's hand down his shorts. Her fingers still rested upon the smooth skin on his shaft and every so often she moved her fingers around on his skin as part of still fondling him. Perhaps it was her hand there, but he couldn't resist the fact he walked right into it.

"My parents might have to hold off on Thanksgiving, though," he concluded.

"Or you and I could do Christmas," she suggested. "But then again, that means you'd have to miss seeing Reno during Christmas."

"How is it during Christmas?"

"Lots and lots of snow up by the Tahoe area and the whole area is just beautiful. It's not here upstate, but it is something unique in and of itself, though."

She shifted her weight next to him but she never released her hand from his shaft.

"We're leaving that Tuesday before Thanksgiving."

"'Cause that Wednesday is crazy as all holy hell."

"Exactly! But between now and then, you've gotta meet my parents." She closed her eyes again.

"And you've gotta meet my own," he followed along. "Also, you know you still have your hand on me, right?"

"Oh, yeah, I know. I just wanna feel how soft and silky your skin is there for a few more seconds before I get up."

Joey fetched up a sigh and kissed her on the lips again.

"Shall we have coffee?" he suggested.

"Please," she whispered as she opened her eyes again so they could lock a gaze for another moment in their quiet place before facing the day.


	2. aunt elka's dress

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _"The morning sun, when it's in your face really shows your age.  
>  But that don't worry me none in my eyes, you're everything.  
> I laughed at all of your jokes, my love you didn't need to coax;  
> I couldn't have tried any more."_  
> -"Maggie May", Rod Stewart

Joey had an uneasy feeling in his stomach as Scott drove him and Hannah back up to Rochester to meet up with her parents. She had joined them there in the studio in Ithaca as they debuted a new song for her ears only: she had to make a promise to not tell anyone about it afterwards. 

Apparently her Aunt Elka was there, too, so Joey would be killing two birds with one stone from the very beginning. Scott had told them he had to run a quick errand there while he camped out there in Ithaca for a bit longer to help with the mastering. Thus, here they were riding with him from the Finger Lakes area back to the Rochester area. Hannah called her parents to claim that she was coming with two friends. She would reveal their relationship to them at a slow pace: she compared it to riding a round of incoming waves.

Joey rode shotgun with his mirrored sunglasses over his brown eyes and his long disheveled curls over his shoulders. Scott had on a little black ball cap atop the crown of his dark hair: the smell emerging from the leather comprising his sleeves and the body of his jacket filled the car. Hannah was bundled up in her little heavy sweater and her padded jeans to keep her legs warm. Every so often, she caught a glimpse of Joey's face in the rear view mirror in front of her.

"I'm glad you guys are going out West for Thanksgiving," Scott admitted at one point. "Especially after the bus accident."

"When are you guys going on tour again?" asked Hannah from the back seat.

"January," Scott replied as he flashed a glimpse into the mirror, "right after New Year's. Jon wants us to take it easy for a bit because of the holidays and also so we can tend to the album."

Within time the skyline of Rochester rose up over the evergreen trees. Hannah guided Scott the way to her apartment complex: her parents lived downstairs from her. Joey sighed through his nose before he climbed out of the car and stood on the sidewalk. He couldn't resist the unnerving feeling in the pit of his stomach as they wound their way through the side streets. It was about to happen: he was about to meet Hannah's parents and her aunt.

She led them to the front door, where she took out her keys and unlocked it. She held it for the both of them; Joey took off his sunglasses and rubbed his eyes once he was inside the front lobby. The flurried feeling in his stomach made him feel sick, especially once they stood there at the elevator doors.

"Thank you for coming up with us, Scott," Hannah told him as they stepped into the tiny car.

"Might as well. It's courteous and whatnot."

He pressed the button, and she huddled closer to Joey. She put her arm around the lower side of his back and rested her hand on his hip. She nestled closer to the side of his chest to feel his heart beat. Scott flashed them a grin as they rode up a bit to the next floor.

The doors squeaked open and he ducked out first, and then she and Joey stood right around him.

"Okay, so which way do we go?" asked Joey in a shaky voice.

"Over yonder," Hannah gestured right behind her. They strode down the left end of the hallway towards her parents' place. Joey let out a low whistle to ease the uncomfortable feeling in the pit of his stomach. He tucked a lock of curly hair behind his ear and squirmed a bit as they stood there before the plain cream colored door. He rested a hand on his stomach.

Hannah glanced back at him.

"Are you okay?" she kindly asked him.

"I am really nervous," he confessed. "My stomach feels like it's tryin' ta leap right out through my throat."

"It's okay," she assured him; she rested her hand on his stomach. "I'm sure my dad has some ginger ale—he always does."

"Want me to knock on the door?" Scott offered as he raised his fist to the door panel.

"Yeah, please do," Hannah answered. His knuckles knocked on the panel three times. There was silence and Joey nibbled on his bottom lip. Hannah let go of him to greet whoever was about to answer the door.

It swung open and they were greeted with a short squat woman with a head of flyaway jet black hair which had a shock of silver on one side, large clear brown eyes, and silvery skin. She was wrapped in a black shawl and floral dress; Joey glanced down at the sensible flats on her feet.

The woman's face lit up as she recognized Hannah.

"There's my little girl!" she declared, and she put her arms around her. Hannah lay her chin upon her shoulder and Joey relaxed a bit. The woman's brown eyes gazed up at him and showed him a sweet smile.

Hannah then turned around to both him and Scott.

"Mom, this is Joey and Scott. My guy friends. And fellas, this is my mom Jen Lafayette-Ellsberg."

"Friends of my daughter are friends of myself and Mark," she told them in a warm tone of voice. "Would you boys like something to eat?"

"Uh, sure!" Scott proclaimed.

"Um, yes? Yes." Joey's voice broke so much that he almost gagged on his own saliva as he cleared his throat. They followed Jen and Hannah into the cozy, warm vast apartment with two corridors on either side of them there at the doorway and a luxurious front room that led right into the cute little kitchen. Everything was of a shade of soft bronze and gold against some splashes of black: the whole place smelled of fresh baked bread and brewed coffee. Joey relaxed even more but he couldn't deny the overly warm feeling surging up his back and around his stomach.

He brushed his curls behind his shoulders and unzipped his jacket.

"May I ask you boys to take off your shoes?" Jen suggested to them as she made her way across the lush looking carpet to the kitchen.

"Oh, yeah!" Scott assured her; he lifted one foot up to take off his Doc Martens. Joey leaned his back against the wall to untie his Chucks. Jen and Hannah talked about something; it took Joey a moment to realize they were talking about him.

"We met... quite a while back," Hannah explained.

"Are you guys—friends?" asked Jen with a knowing smile on her face.

"Oh, yeah. And Scott's our friend, too."

Joey glanced up at them once he had pried his left shoe off of his foot. 

"He's so skinny, honey," she told Hannah in a low voice. "You've gotta feed him better than that."

"He's a hockey player so he burns it off pretty quickly."

"Oh, I see."

Joey tossed his hair back with a flick of his head as he unlaced his right shoe. Scott, meanwhile, had removed both of his boots and stood there for a moment in repose.

"Where's Daddy and Aunt Elka?" asked Hannah once she was in the kitchen.

Scott turned to the left and bumped into a small slender woman with full hips and that same head of jet black hair. She almost looked Asian from her smooth but pointed features and milky white skin. She had carried a glass of something bubbly and yellow, probably apple cider. But Scott running into her had caused her to spill the glass right on her dress.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" he declared.

"Right there," Jen's voice carried out from the kitchen.

"Oh, gosh, I'm so sorry," said Scott as he glanced around for something to help her clean up.

"No, no, it is alright," Aunt Elka consoled him in a gentle Norwegian accent.

"Ohhhh—shit," Scott muttered under his breath; Joey turned his head and spotted a dish towel on the stand next to him.

"Here, Scott—" He handed Scott the towel.

"Oh, thanks, Joe!" He turned back to Aunt Elka to mop up the cider from her towel. "Where'd I get ya?"

"Right here—" She gestured to the shawl right over her left breast.

"I wasn't payin' attention," Scott assured her as he dabbed the shawl with the towel.

"Looks like most of it got on the floor?" Joey pointed out as he hung up his jacket on the hook next to the door.

"Yes, it did," she said. Scott set the towel on the heavy wood to mop it up. He raised his head to look at her right into her dark eyes.

"I think we're good?"

"You are so sweet," she remarked with a smile upon her face. He shrugged his shoulders.

"I try my best," he confessed with a chuckle. "Hey, at least you didn't drop the glass!"

"And there is no shortage of the cider, either," she assured him, still keeping her smile in place.

"Yeah, guys!" Hannah called from the kitchen. "Come on in here and have some of my dad's homemade cider!"

"Homemade cider and pigs in a blanket," Jen followed it up.


	3. tea time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this while it was snowing to give it a homier feeling

Scott took a seat at the counter next to Joey and Hannah there in the kitchen. His long dark hair fell over his shoulders as he rested his arms on the counter top. Aunt Elka showed him a sweet little smile as she passed him into the narrow space in between the drawers and the refrigerator. Hannah noticed the warm blush blooming over his face: the thick eyebrows only accentuated the pinkish hue.

Jen had her eye on Joey in particular as she handed him a glass of sparkling cider. Right behind her stood a cake stand with what resembled to a carrot cake with its creamy white frosting and little orange spots all over the top, right there underneath a glass lid.

"Care for a slice of cake?" she offered him with a friendly grin on her face.

"Yes, please," he said with a coy shrug of his shoulders. As she turned away from the counter to serve the three of them each a plate of spice cake, Joey felt something creep on his thigh. He took a glimpse down to find Hannah resting her hand there next to his knee. Without turning his head, he glanced up at her and into her dark eyes.

Before Aunt Elka could speak up, Scott cleared his throat.

"Who're those two guys, if you don't mind me askin'?"

Joey turned to find Scott gesturing to the framed photograph on the wall over the sink. He spotted two dark skinned men next to Elka, two men who almost resembled him in a way. The one on the right had hair which had been cut much shorter, almost to that of a sensible respectable level, and he wore a heavy Navy jacket. The one on the left had a heavy handlebar mustache and shoulder length curls.

"The one in the military jacket is my Grandpa Lafayette," Hannah explained.

"My dad," Jen filled in as she delved through the drawer for a knife.

"And the guy with the mustache was my uncle Kane," Hannah continued, "Elka's husband."

Scott swallowed at the sound of that. Joey looked over at him and then at Elka's hand. No ring to be found. She fetched up a sigh right then.

"Is... he coming?" Scott asked in a small voice. Silence hung over them for a momentary lapse, and Joey put two and two together.

"My dear husband is no longer with us," she replied with a wistful look upon her face.

"It was... early onset Alzheimer's," Hannah followed up. "My grandma Lafayette had it, too. She was much older, though. In her eighties."

"Kane meanwhile was almost fifty," Jen filled in.

"Oh—Oh, damn," Scott breathed out. "I'm sorry."

Aunt Elka shook her head.

"No, no. It is okay. He is always with us in spirit." She fingered a round glass and silver pendant around her neck; Scott made out the texture of dust on the inside.

Joey took a sip of the cider and the taste of apples smacked him right square in the lips. He held the glass back from his mouth.

"What's up, ba—Joey?" asked Hannah with a raise of the eyebrow.

"Scott, you gotta try some of this," he quipped.

"It's delicious, isn't it?" she showed him a smile. Scott took a sip himself and then closed his eyes to better relish the taste of it. Jen turned to her daughter and Joey with small black china plates with slices of that warm spice cake. The white creamy frosting looked sweet and enticing, as if inviting Joey home: the actual cake was dark and peppered with little black spots. He dropped his gaze to Hannah's hand still resting on his thigh, right above his knee.

She was eating left handed.

"Oh—Oh, my God, that's glorious," Scott swooned once he took another sip of cider.

"So Hannah tells me you fellas are in a band together," Jen started up again as she handed Scott a slice of cake.

"Thank you! Yeah, we're a—" Scott cleared his throat and set down the glass to try the cake. "—a rock n' roll band. I play guitar, gorgeous Joe over here sings and sometimes drums."

"Gorgeous Joe!" Aunt Elka laughed at that as she poured herself a fresh glass of cider. Joey cocked his head from side to side and shrugged as he took a bite of cake.

"A singer _and_ a drummer!" Jen exclaimed as she rested her one hand on her hip and her other on the edge of the counter. "Can you do both a la—Phil Collins or something?"

"I—" Joey almost gagged on his bite of cake. "—I did for a tiny little bit." He covered his mouth with his hand. He then swallowed it down. "It's definitely a challenge."

"You should sing for us at some point, Joey," Jen suggested.

"He's got a very nice voice," Hannah told her; she didn't look at him, but her fingers crawled down the front of his knee cap onto his shin. "A very—very, very nice tenor voice."

Joey knew she wanted to describe his voice as "erotic" or "sexy" and that it left her feeling hot, but couldn't given the place and time. All he had at the moment was the feeling of her hand on his knee as she crept into the space between his thighs.

"Oh, tenors are lovely. Innocent and creamy and lush and sweet, like the frosting on that cake."

"This cake is amazing, by the way," Joey continued as he took another bite.

"Yeah, my compliments to the baker," Scott added.

"It was my recipe," said Elka with a modest raise of her hand, and Scott patted his chest with his free hand.

"You know, we're going out to Reno—out in Nevada for Thanksgiving," Jen continued; she gave her hair a gentle toss with the tips of her fingers. "Going to visit Hannah's cousins and her grandparents. I can see her logic behind wanting to introduce my sister-in-law and myself to her friends. And since it is coming close to the holidays, I want to ask what you boys are doing for that time."

"Dinner at my parents' house," Joey told her as he swallowed down another bite of cake.

"Same here," Scott followed up. "Probably nothin'. We do have a tour comin' in January but that's a ways off, though."

"Oh, yeah, that's plenty of time to do stuff," Jen said with a slight snicker. "Anyways, I ask that because of my whole point of 'friends of Hannah's are friends of ours.' When we get to Reno, we're gonna go up to Lake Tahoe and go skiing. With the money that Hannah made with her commissions, salvaging our apartment and keeping Mark and I at home instead of getting pushed out onto the street, we were able to rent out a cabin near the shores. And... according to the guides, there's a spare room in the cabin."

Joey and Scott glanced at one another.

"You want us to join you," Scott followed along.

"If you boys want," said Jen with a shrug. "You don't have to if you don't want to."

"Marcus is... out there right now," Aunt Elka added before she took a sip of cider.

"Yeah, Mark is out in Carson City," Jen pressed on, "sorting out some clientele paperwork. Hannah's got some people out West looking for her."

"The best pizza on the West Coast is in Truckee, by the way," Hannah interjected.

"I gotta try that," Joey told her.

"Yeah, me, too," Scott chimed in.

"Also, Hannah?" Jen started again. She raised her eyebrows at her mother.

"Francine can come along if she'd like."

"I'll give 'er a ring," Hannah vowed. "The more, the merrier."

"The more, the merrier," Scott declared and he and Joey clinked their glasses together.


	4. “you sent me flying”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _"And although my pride is not easy to disturb, yeah.  
>  You sent me flying when you kicked me to the curb  
> with your battered jeans and your Beasties tee.  
> Now I can't work like this, with you next to me."_  
> -"You Sent Me Flying/Cherry", Amy Winehouse

"Frank... Frankie, Frank!"

"Huh? Wha?" He lifted his head from Francine's chest: his wavy long dark hair dangled down over her taut nipples which only made her giggle her head off.

"Phone!" she exclaimed. Frankie reached out from underneath the blankets for the phone on the nightstand. He almost gagged on his own saliva as he picked up the receiver.

"Hullo?" he sputtered.

"Hey, Frankie."

"Hannah?"

Francine hoisted herself onto her elbows: her bare breasts relaxed but remained pointed from the chill of the air around them. Frankie had long pulled out but she could still feel him right between her legs and right inside of her butt. She gazed on at his nude body looming right before her with a faint sheen of moisture lining his skin.

"Hannah, what's up?" he asked her, clearing his throat.

"I wanted to ask if you and Francine wanted to come to Reno with Joey, Scott, and me over Thanksgiving, that is if you guys aren't doing anything then."

"Ehh, I'm probably doing nothing—" He lowered the mouth piece of the phone towards the side of his neck. "Are we doing anything for Thanksgiving?"

"Not really. Why—" She showed him a smile. "You wanna do another double date, Hannah Banana Bread?"

Hannah herself laughed over the phone.

"She was wondering if we wanted to go out to Nevada with her, Joey, and Scott," Frankie explained in a single breath.

"Oh, fuck yeah!" Francine declared. "See her family?"

Frankie brought the phone back to his ear.

"See your family and all that shizz?"

"Yeah, we're gonna see my grandparents and my cousins and hang out in a cabin up by Lake Tahoe," she continued. "We'll be leaving on the Tuesday before." Frankie moved the phone back to the side of his neck.

"Big ass cabin by the lake," he echoed. "Leaving Tuesday."

"Yes, please!” Francine squealed. “Also Joey’s parents called here earlier—they wanna know if their baby boy is gonna do the holidays with them.”

“D’you hear that?” Frankie asked with a short huff of breath into the mouthpiece.

"I did! I’ll run it by him as soon as possible. Also, Frankie?"

He brought the phone back to his mouth. "Yeah?"

"Are you okay? You sound like you've been running a mile."

"Let's just say I pretty much was," he said in a broken voice. There was a pause on her end and then she giggled.

"Uh-huh, yeah! Yeah, get on it, Frankie! Have fun, you two—" She hung up and Frankie followed suit as he dove down on his girlfriend for another round. He hesitated there with his hands on either side of her shoulders.

"Want me to make you into a motor boat, babe?" he offered to her.

"You sure you wanna motor boat and not sail?" she teased him.

"Now, that's if you got me on my back—" He put his head down into her chest, and blew, and shook his head about.

Meanwhile, back in Rochester, Joey couldn't hardly stop thinking about Aunt Elka's kindness towards Scott. She had him all in a hot mess: he hadn't seen his band mate and friend like this before in the time they had known each other. This older Norwegian lady treated the both of them with such kindness and sweetness that even Joey himself found himself smiling at the thought and sight of her.

Maybe it was the shocking black hair with her high features: her cheekbones rounded out and filled out like little apples when she smiled. She did resemble to his best friend after all.

He made room for her on the soft plush couch as she took a seat next to the arm. She gazed into his brown eyes and he bowed his head a bit.

"So shy," she remarked.

"I try not to be," he admitted to her with a shrug of his shoulders. "You know, especially when I'm—y'know, performing."

"I want to hear you sing at some point," she suggested as she tucked a lock of her black hair behind her ear. She eyed the straight bridge of his aquiline nose and the stray tendrils of black curls crowning his head.

"I'll try and whip out a little somethin' for the trip, I promise," he told her. She reached out to touch his hand resting there on his thigh. His stomach tied into a tight knot. He had no idea what else to say to her right then, that is until Scott strode into the room with another full glass of cider.

"Also, how did you two enjoy the cake?" she asked them.

"It was wonderful," Joey replied with a raise of his dark eyebrows. "Like getting a hug around the belly." He took a glimpse down at his waist: it would be some time before that bruise fully healed. It didn't ache him as much but he still felt it whenever Hannah caressed or kissed him there.

"Quite dirty," Scott blurted out. "I mean—quite tasty?"

Joey nibbled on his bottom lip at that. He eyed Scott's fingers as they twitched on the rim of his glass. He lowered one eyebrow at the sight before him.

"You say that like it's a question," Aunt Elka teased him.

"Maybe it is a question," Scott continued as he raised his thick dark eyebrows at her. “Like, how can something so tasty be so good?”

Joey squinted his eyes at him.

“Scott, what’s the temperature outside right now?” he asked.

“Dirty two. I mean—!” Scott clasped his free hand to his mouth. “Dirty mind? Thirty two, I mean. Thirty and do?”

Aunt Elka burst out laughing at him: her laugh resembled to that of wine glasses tinkling together. She then patted Joey’s thigh and stood to her feet, and doubled back to the kitchen, where Jen and Hannah were conversing with one another about something.

Scott let out a low whistle and ran his free hand through his dark hair and then down his chest. Joey’s eyes gleamed at him.

"—are you okay," he asked him in a flat voice.

"I dunno—what the fuck happened there to be honest, Joey."

He closed his eyes and started chuckling. He bowed his head and buried his face in his hands,

“What?” Scott scoffed.

“This weekend is gonna be fu-u-un,” Joey cracked as he rubbed his face with his fingers.

“Fucking Hannah before all of Reno and having the Franks screwing away right there next to ya?”

“Shhhh!” Joey hissed. They froze and turned their heads to the kitchen doorway. The women paid no attention to them.

“You gotta tell ‘er mom at some point, Joey,” Scott pointed out.

“I know... it’s just a matter of when, though. That goes for my parents, too. And you gotta relax around Aunt Elka, too.”

“You and I have our work cut out for us, to be honest.” Scott tipped his glass back into his lips for a drink.

“It’s not like with Frankie, though,” Joey teased him.

Scott swallowed it down and nodded his head.

“Yeah, one of the few times I’m actually jealous of Frankie for once.” He took another sip of cider as Hannah returned to the living room: her cheekbones were full with her accompanying smile.

“Hello, boys! The Franks are coming with us out West, so it’s gonna be a party down up at Lake Tahoe and in northern Nevada. Also, Joey?”

He raised his gaze to her.

“Your mama and daddy wanna know what you’re doing in the days ahead.”

“Which means—“ His stomach tied into a knot again.

“I have to meet your parents now,” she said.

“Oh boy,” Scott muttered as he took another sip.


	5. somewhere upstate, part one

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _"And I guess the bad can get better,  
>  gotta be wrong before it's right.  
> Every happy phrase engraved in my mind  
> and I've always been a go-getter."_  
> -"Growing Pains", Alessia Cara

"You guys mind if I drive you there?" Scott volunteered.

"Not at all, man," Joey said with a run of his fingers through his black curls. He tugged the seat belt across his chest and put his mirrored sunglasses back onto his face. Scott curled his fingers around the rim of the steering wheel as Hannah climbed into the back seat right behind him.

Scott nibbled on his bottom lip as they started the drive along that narrow road over to Oswego. Joey glanced over at him with a pensive expression on his face and his arms resting upon the top of the seat. They looked like a couple of man whores with their leather jackets and their long hair dangling around their heads: Hannah lounged there in the back seat as if she acted as their madam.

The two of them were quiet the whole hour long trip to Joey's hometown. Hannah knew the boys with the filthiest minds were the quietest ones, and thus she couldn't resist the smile on her face as she recognized the outskirts of the town. Scott drummed his fingers all along the rim of the steering wheel as they reached the first stoplight. Joey could still taste the spice cake on the inside of his mouth: when he ran his tongue along his lips, he found a piece of frosting on his corner.

 _How long has that been there?_ he asked himself. He turned his head to the side a bit so Hannah could see him running his tongue along his dark lips. She grinned at him as a result; he thought of hers, especially the ones between her thighs. A bit of sugar from his girl's lips.

Scott sighed through his nose. He couldn't hardly shake Aunt Elka from his mind. That dark shawl around her shoulders and her soft chest, those full hips, and that sexy Norwegian accent. Joey and Hannah flirting with each other wasn't helping matters, either.

Joey guided Scott to his parents' cute little house by the lake side. His stomach flurried with butterflies once again because he knew that he, too, would have to fully come clean with them about Hannah. And yet she seemed to be taking it with a bit of ease on her end.

And yet running his tongue out of his mouth for her left him feeling a little big. His jeans tightened, but he dared not unbutton them what with Scott being there. But Scott meanwhile found himself feeling a little too warm from the thought of Aunt Elka. That car grew more and more tense even as they pulled up to the driveway; he let out a low whistle before he bowed his head over the rim of the steering wheel.

Joey on the other hand couldn't climb out of the car faster and into the cool crisp afternoon air. He opened his jacket to better breathe. Hannah joined him there on the concrete and ran her hand down his chest and his stomach.

"Oh, God, you're toasty," she remarked as she tickled him a bit.

"Yeah, 'cause you're a babe and a half," he teased her; he lunged back at the feathery touch of her fingers. She reached down for the crotch of his jeans but he knitted his thighs together. Scott ducked out of the car behind them.

"Oi, love birds," he called out. "Let's get on it, shall we?"

"Sure," Joey replied with a lack of breath. He led them to the front step. He stood before Hannah as if presenting her as a surprise to his parents. His mother, this little Iroquois-Italian woman with silvery curls and those same large brown eyes which resembled to marbles, greeted them there on the step.

"There's my baby!" She put her arms around his slim waist and laid the side of her head on his chest. "Warmest hug ever..."

"Mom—" Joey began as he stepped aside to show off Hannah. "—this is Hannah. She's my friend."

His mother raised her dark eyebrows at her.

"She's Indian, too," he continued, his voice trembling. She clasped a hand to her chest as if she had seen the Virgin Mary.

"Oh, Joey, she's beautiful," she breathed. "Like two moonbeams came down and made a young lady."

"I can't believe I'm actually meeting you," Hannah said with a slight bow to her head and a smile upon her face.

"Come on in, sweetheart—" She strode into the front foyer of the house first, which left Joey and Scott to glance at each other. The latter let out another low whistle, this time out of relief.

"God—" he muttered as he shook his head.

"Got the first one down," Joey followed up with a run of his hand down his chest and his stomach. "I wonder what my dad'll think 'cause he's more the trad one."


	6. somewhere upstate, part two

"Fuck, I'm so nervous," Scott confessed in a low voice.

" _You're_ nervous?" Joey scoffed as he closed the front door behind them. “You're not the one with the trad as holy hell parents! I'm glad my mom likes Hannah at the moment but—” He wiped his hands together to find his palms damp with perspiration.

“What's the matter?” asked Scott.

“My hands are sweaty. Ugh. God, I hate this.”

“Joey—Joey—Joey—” Scott pressed his hands to the sides of Joey's face and peered into his dark eyes. “—relax. Okay? Listen to my voice. Listen to my voice—breathe. Okay?”

He let out a sigh and Joey followed suit with his eyes closed.

“Relax,” Scott lowered his voice to a near whisper. The sound of Hannah's laughter caught Joey's ear; he swallowed and fetched up a sigh again.

“Can you let go of my face now?” he asked in a muffled voice.

“Sure—” Scott patted his face before he took off his jacket and hung it up on the hook next to the door. Joey nibbled on his bottom lip and followed suit right there next to him. He pried off his shoes when his father in all of his still curly salt and pepper hair crowning his head and olive skin strode into the room right then.

“Hi, son—” He had that same drawl of an Italian American accent as his son. “—and Scott!”

“Hi, Dad—” Joey stood to his feet to put his arms around him.

“Who's that young lady in the kitchen with your mother?” His dad had the same lopsided grin as him.

“That's Hannah. She's—my friend.” Joey's stomach did a flip flop when he said that.

“Just your friend?”

“Just my friend, yeah.”

His father had a mischievous look on his handsome face, one that made Joey himself squirm and curl his toes into the cool floor of the foyer. His stomach turned and he exhaled.

“Well, she seems to be gelling rather well with yer mom, and I'm glad you boys came when you did—lunch is almost ready.”

Joey nodded his head and tried to ease the unnerving feeling in his stomach and the warmth blooming in his face as his dad flashed him a wink and another smirk. Once they were alone in the foyer again, Joey bowed his head and let his long curls blanket his face.

Scott strode up next to him.

“Kill me,” he whispered. “Fucking—kill me.”

“Why?”

“I'm fucking dyin' here, Scott—I can't take it. The tension is killing me.” He ran his fingers through his hair and stood upright.

But then as he and Scott stepped into the cute bright lit kitchen, he was captivated by the sight of Hannah enjoying a cup of fresh brewed at the table as his mother served her a rather large bowl of gnocchi with a warm cheese sauce and a slice of fresh baked French bread, the latter of which she lifted to her nose for a whiff.

“Oh, Mrs. Bellardini, this bread smells incredible!” she declared. “I've always loved that smell, too—it's without a doubt my favorite. I've always loved smelling it after coming home from a long day at the gallery or the studio.”

“Oh, honey, please call me Mom,” Joey's mother insisted and Joey almost fainted at the sound of that. Her face lit up at the sight of her son standing there in the doorway. “There he is! The man of the hour and his minion! Come on in and grab yourselves a clean bowl both—”

Once she served him a bowl of that gnocchi and handed him a slice of bread, Joey took his seat there next to Hannah and let out a low whistle.

“Are you okay?” she asked him as she brought the fork to her mouth.

“Yeah—yeah—”

“You look like you're about to pass out,” she confessed with a slight snicker.

“Well, it's probably 'cause I'm hungry,” he covered for himself, and she showed him a little smile. But then again, that spice cake he had had at her parents' place filled him up plenty and at that point, he and Scott both were about to filled to complete satiation with even more bread and cream. Both men had seconds like they did with the spice cake.

Like being hugged around the waist and having the warmth spread all over his flat belly and down into his hips. Indeed, eating all of that hearty food set his stomach at such ease that all he wanted to do was pass out on the couch there in his parents' living room. The feeling only blossomed some more as Scott volunteered to help clean the kitchen.

But then again, Hannah coaxed him into the back hallway which took them towards his old bedroom. Scott's voice carried after them as they crept towards the bathroom and the linen closet there at the end of the hall. Joey let out a low whistle as he ran his fingers through his curls again and then that same hand down his belly. She pressed herself against his body to feel his warmth.

“Oh, baby's got a full tummy—” She patted the back of his hand and then put her arms around his slim waist. He leaned his back against the wall next to the door of his old room. She felt warm herself; she pushed her breasts together and pressed herself against his chest. He was soft, warm, and full, but that didn't stop her from kissing his neck and his face.

“Wait, wait, wait—” he sputtered as he lay his hands atop her breasts to stop her.

“What?” she asked him in a hushed voice.

“We gotta do this here?”

“Well, Scott's helping your dad clean the kitchen—it only made sense to me to have a little moment with you, baby.” She ran her finger down his warm chest. “You know I like it when you're all soft and silky like this. You know I like it when you're feeling warm and sleepy.”

“Like being in the quiet place again,” he whispered to her with a smirk on his face.

“Exactly like being in the quiet place.” He turned his head to the door to his right.

“This was my room, by the way,” he told her.

“This door right here?”

“Right here.” He reached to the doorknob and opened the door in one fell swoop. They were met with a rush of cold air: the dark hairs on Joey's arm stood on end. “I spent the first twenty years of my life in between these four walls here. Wanna come inside?”

“Oh, baby, you'd know I'd love to—”

He slid into the room first: his bed was still there, as well as his threadbare faded gray hockey jersey in the sliding closet off to the right side. Hannah picked up the blank mask on the nightstand to examine for herself.

“Oh, that's my hockey mask!” Joey explained as he ran his fingers through his curls again. She caressed the front of the mask with the pads of her thumbs: she fingered the dents over the forehead and the cheekbones.

“Cost about eighty dollars,” he continued to her. “Made just for my face and no one else.”

“No one else?” she teased him. “So I can't wear it if I wanted to?”

“Why would you wanna wear my stinkin' hockey mask? My stinkin' hockey mask that I've sweated and spat over and has been smacked numerous times with a puck and whatnot?”

“'Cause you wore it. 'Cause it smells like you. Same goes for that jersey over there.”

Joey looked down at the waist of his jeans and undid the button.

“I thought we weren't doing this here,” she retorted.

“What? It's my room and my pants are cutting off my circulation right now 'cause my stomach's so full right now. More importantly, you're a girl in my room and—”

He backed up to the door to push it closed except for the slight sliver in between the edge and the door frame.

“—we have some privacy now.” He unzipped his jeans and let them cling onto his hips. She tossed her dark hair back before she climbed onto the bed. She lay onto her back and pointed out her chest for him.

He crawled over her body; he lingered over her face, such that his black curls dangled down over her skin. She reached down to feel his warm stomach at first: she was about to reach down his jeans to fondle him.

“Joey!” his mother called out from the front of the house. He froze in place and looked over his shoulder.

“Joey!” she called out again and he scrambled off of Hannah and the top of the bed. “Joey!”

“Shit—” he muttered as he fumbled the button on his jeans; he was too full. “—shit, fuck—God damn it—”

“Joseph Anthony Bellardini!”

“Oh, Jesus Christ—I don't like it when my mom calls me by my full name—usually means I'm in deep shit—I'll be right back, Hannah, babe—”


	7. somewhere upstate, part three

Joey stumbled out of the bedroom into the hallway with his pants still undone and his stomach very full. He tugged down the bottom of his shirt to hide the loose waist band on his jeans from his mother. He wondered what she had called him into the next room for as he staggered into the living room and tugged on the band of his jeans. Using his other hand, he pushed his black curls back from his face.

Scott laughed at him as he almost fell onto his side on the floor.

"You alright, buddy?" Scott called to him.

"God, I'm so full right now," Joey muttered as he rubbed his slim belly; he examined Scott's face and the sheen of blush around his skin. "Full as an egg. Anyways—" He lifted his gaze to his mother standing there in the kitchen doorway with a fretful expression on her lovely face.

"—what's goin' on?"

"Is it true that you and Scott had cake before you came here?" his mother demanded. Joey turned to Scott who shrugged at him.

"What'd you tell her?" he asked in a hushed voice and a knitting of his eyebrows.

"I didn't say anything!" Scott insisted. Joey paused and brought a hand to his mouth. He breathed onto his palm and took a whiff. He could still smell a residual bit of the spice from the cake earlier. He lowered his hand to his chest and shifted his weight there on the floor.

His mother folded her arms over her chest and shook her head at him.

"Yes, we did," he said through gritted teeth and with a bow of his head.

"Also, you know your pants are unfastened," she pointed out.

"I was... in... the bathroom?" he stammered as he fumbled the button on his jeans which in turn showed off the lush brown skin on his belly.

"And Scott also tells me that the two of you are going out West with sweet Hannah for Thanksgiving?"

"Us and—Frankie," Scott corrected her.

"If... it's okay?" Joey's voice shrank down to an almost mousy tone. She smirked at him and then shook her head again. She ambled over to him and put her arms around his waist.

"My little boy—growing up so quickly." She stared into his face and then pushed a pair of curled locks of his jet black hair out of his eyes. "And becoming so handsome." Scott snickered at the sound of that. "Of course you can, baby. Just so you're coming to Christmas."

"Of course! Can she come along, too?"

"You know she can, sweetie. She's your best friend." She pressed her lips to the side of his face and his knees all but buckled right there. Her dark eyes locked onto his as she brushed some more of his hair out of his eyes. And then she lay her head on his chest.

"The warmest hug ever," she whispered, and then she pulled back to look into his face again. "I'm going to send the two of you off with some cannoli when you leave." She tapped on the tip of his nose.

"No, Mom, we can't," he insisted.

"No, no! They'll love it, I promise." She backed off and returned to the kitchen. He turned to Scott who shook his head and burst out laughing again. Joey looked down at the bottom of his shirt and the band of his jeans still undone: the button and the hole poked out from underneath his shirt, and yet it was the least of his concern. Scott doubled back into the kitchen, which was his cue to return to his old bedroom.

Joey ducked back into the room, where Hannah had removed her shirt and put on his old hockey jersey, the bottom of which fitted her full shapely body and the neckline showed off a bit of skin on her chest; she was about to take off her jeans.

"What was going on?" she asked him. He licked his lips at the sight of the jersey on her.

"My mom being your standard Italian mom," he explained at a deliberate pace; he then turned back and closed the door to a slight crack. "I ate from another family's dinner table. I dunno how she picked up that tiny little bit of smell of spice cake on my breath but she did. But she did say I could go out to Reno, just so long as you come home with me to Christmas."

"Absolutely!" she chirped. "I'd love to. I think I'll paint something while we're in Reno for them. I love your parents."

He fetched up a sigh and relaxed at the sound of that.

"Also, um," his voice broke, "my mom is gonna make us cannoli to take out there with us."

She lay a hand on her chest and showed him a sweet smile.

"Shall we cuddle?" she suggested with a pat on the spot of the bed next to her.

"Here?" he asked her.

"Yeah. I was laying here and I thought 'why the hell not?' So I took off my shirt and put on your jersey." She kicked off her jeans to reveal her thick legs.

"It's fucking sexy on you, by the way. I mean, God damn." He smirked at her and then reached down for the bottom of his shirt. He peeled it off and tossed it towards the closet door. She remained there with her back to the headboard as he crawled onto the bed next to her. Even though part of his left side hung off the edge of the bed, he leaned back against the headboard and set his hands on his stomach.

"I'm gonna rub your belly so softly," she told him. She sank down next to him and turned over onto her side. She ran her hand down his soft silky skin. "—oh God, you're so warm—"

That did feel so good on his part. She ran her fingers around the top part of his stomach and then down around his waist.

At one point, she gazed into his brown eyes, and he gazed into her brown eyes. She hung closer to his face, to his dark lips, and smiled at him.

"Not really the best kind of bed to have a quickie, honey pie," he told her.

"Maybe on the edge of the bed," she suggested.

"You wanna fuck me silly on the edge of my bed," he said in a flat voice. "My fucking bed. My fucking bed for twenty years, the bed I slept in since before we met."

"Yes," she whispered into his lips.

"My belly's all bloated, though. Feel me. Feel me."

"I'm feelin' you, alright." She yanked on the waist band of his jeans.

"—fucking shit—ow! Hannah!"

"Come on, Joe!" she insisted as she peeled down his underwear. "Come on, baby. I'm in your jersey, you're all warm and soft right now."

"We have officially met each other's parents, too," he pointed out with a shrug. "As long as we keep it quiet."

"We can just keep things quiet," she echoed in a near whisper.

"If we keep things quiet, we can fully experience another side of our relationship together."

"And I wanna just—just—"

She caressed his shaft with two fingers which tickled him. He gasped and hung still right there.

"We're gonna do it in the cabin," he promised to her in a low husky voice.

"Please," she begged as she brought her lips to his head. She gave him a good licking and then she brought her hands back to his shaft. She tugged on him as if she was pulling a lever.

"If I gotta tie you up, I'll do it," she vowed.

"Ooh, nasty!" he joked.

"Get on the side of the bed, you bad boy," she commanded as she flicked his head. She climbed over his legs and stood in that little space between the side of the bed and the wall there.

"You guys want the door closed?" Scott's voice called in through the door; the sound of his voice startled the both of them, such that Joey fell off the bed and onto the floor, right before her feet.

"Damn it," Scott muttered. "I'll take that as a 'yes'."

"Please do, Scott," Hannah insisted in a hushed voice. He winked at her before he closed the door all the way. She glanced down at Joey on the floor on his side right at her feet.

"I oughta just fuck yer feet right here," he teased her, which brought a snicker out of her. He rubbed his stomach again and grimaced. She reached down underneath the jersey and peeled down her panties.

"Let me help your poor little belly, you bad boy."

"More dessert!" he squeaked. He clasped onto her lower legs and brought his tongue in between her lips. She gasped and groaned in her throat. He closed his eyes as his tongue stretched into her lips. This was in fact the cherry on top, the biggest slice of apple pie just for him, even with his slender belly distended and his heart full. His hands caressed up underneath the jersey onto her belly and her chest: he could feel her nipples, pointed and hard right on her breasts.

"What are you to me?" he asked her in a breathy voice, in between caresses of his tongue and fondles of her nipples. "What are you?"

"I'm—I'm—" she sputtered.

"What are you?" he whispered to her.

"I'm your best friend," she breathed out and then gasped. He let go of her lips and lay down on his back on the floor underneath her. She stepped out of her panties and squatted down over his hips. She bowed down over him for a nibble on his waist: every so often she nibbled on him after she gyrated over his hips.

That switching, between her teeth and that swirling movement over his hips, brought him to a strange point, one that wasn't like any other time they did it together. That little point of pain in between pleasure. And his parents and Scott in the other room.

That sense of danger. They were in fact venturing down another part of their relationship together. And that rise, his about to get off, left him wanting more of it when they left for Reno.


	8. the flight

_November 25, 1986_.

"Called Jon and he assured me that we're not going back on tour until January," Scott explained as he hoisted his overnight bag over his shoulder. Dan and Charlie had driven the five of them all to LaGuardia Airport, there in the heart of New York City and now were seeing them off before their flight out to Reno. Frankie led Francine to the gate; Scott padded right behind them. Hannah and Joey had entwined their hands together as they brought up the rear.

"Is this us right here?" Joey asked her; he gestured to the eleventh gate off to the right.

"Yup, this is us! Frankie and Frankie!"

The two of them turned around with befuddled expressions on their faces for a second; Francine then led him towards the five of them with a bout of laughter.

"You guys have a safe flight, alright?" Charlie told Hannah as he held her close to his chest.

"Of course, of course—" she assured him.

"Call us when you get there," Dan suggested to her once Charlie let go of her.

"We will, Danny," she said, "well, I might—I dunno 'bout these three little birds here, but when I find a phone Francine or I'll give you a ring."

Once they all had exchanged embraces, Dan and Charlie saw them off as they headed into the hallway making up the terminal and towards the body of the plane. Hannah led them to their seats right behind first class: Joey figured she hadn't made enough money off of commissions to land them spots there into first class, and yet he had no concern or desire over it whatsoever. He was getting to fly out West with his girl to meet up with her extended family for the first time ever.

"So when are your parents getting here?" Frankie asked her from across the aisle. Scott, who took his seat behind the Franks, ran his fingers through his dark hair and raised his thick eyebrows so he resembled a cartoon character.

"My parents?" she echoed as she slipped her purse in between her legs. "Like any minute now."

"I hope they get here soon enough," Joey muttered. "We're supposed to leave like... what. Ten minutes or something?"

"Something like that, yeah—" Hannah lifted her gaze to the door in front of them in time to see her father Marcus Ellsberg, a tall but stout Nordic man with sparse light hair capping his head and wrapped in a windbreaker. Joey's stomach tightened at the sight of him: now he knew where she had inherited her high features from, and it was intense to witness before his eyes.

"Daddy!" she said in a hushed voice. Marcus' face lit up at the sight of her.

"There's my baby girl!" he declared as she lunged at him for a hug. He peered over at her shoulder at Joey, who bowed his head and swallowed down his nervousness, but nothing could deny the butterflies in the pit of his stomach. Hannah turned away from her father and smiled at Joey.

"You must be Joey," said Marcus in a soft voice. He swallowed again and shifted his weight in his seat.

"You alright, son?"

"Yeah, I'm just—just—"

"He's a little nervous," Hannah filled in for him. Jen boarded right behind them and Hannah gave her a hug as well; her face lit up when she recognized Joey and Scott. The latter blushed when he recognized Aunt Elka right behind Jen, and he sputtered and stuttered as she took her seat next to him at the window. The three of them introduced themselves to Frankie courtesy of both Hannah and Francine.

And much to Joey's chagrin, Marcus and Jen took their seats right behind him and Hannah.

"So how long is this flight?" asked Scott as the door closed and they prepared take flight from there.

"Seven hours total," Marcus replied.

Joey bowed his head and squirmed in his seat. Those butterflies did something to him: there was a dull pain right there in the pit of his stomach that dug away at him. It wasn't like those butterflies he'd get before a show, especially at one of their larger gigs, but rather like the ones he'd get whenever the topic of their parents came up, or even so much as losing Hannah herself once again. It was a horrendous feeling, one that only worsened with the take off and the rise of the plane into the sky overhead.

Hannah noticed the grimace on his handsome face and leaned in closer to him.

"Are you okay?" she kindly asked him.

"Stomach's bothering me," he confessed to her. "I'm so ungodly nervous right now."

"Aw—" Hannah set her hand on Joey's flat stomach to ease the feeling. She was about to lean in towards his body to cuddle him but he nudged at her.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa—you wanna do that here?" He lowered his voice to a near whisper.

"Oh, right, right, right."

He gestured for her to come closer to his face. She eyed the tip of his nose and his dark lips; he could smell the soft soapy perfume wafting off of the crown of her head and the side of her neck.

"Wait until after take off," he advised her. She gazed into his brown eyes, as rich and brown as the very earth they were leaving for a while. And then she pulled away to look across the aisle at Frankie and Francine flashing mischievous grins at them.

As they rose high above the New York skyline and over the heart of New Jersey, the lights telling everyone to fasten their seat belts flickered off: Joey couldn't take it anymore and he scrambled out of his seat down the narrow aisle to the bathroom there at the far end across from the little station there for the stewardesses.

It was so far away that he knew he would be out of earshot.

He ducked into the bathroom and was about to close the door when something blocked it there at the bottom. He peered out to find Hannah there with him.

"Occupied," he teased her in a flash and a hiss of a voice. She bowed her head a bit as if to tease him.

He peeked out to the space there across from them: they were alone back there. And then he gestured for her to come inside.

It was a cramped little space of a bathroom, with barely enough room for Hannah herself much less the both of them. But Joey managed to push the door closed and seal the lock so no one would bother them. His stomach was in agony but he couldn't help himself.

"Fuck—" he whispered as she pressed her lips onto his and ran her hands down his chest. She held onto the buttons of his shirt and opened it up to reveal his smooth brown skin.

"Fuck—me—" he begged her.

"I'm trying to," she whispered into his face. She kissed his neck and ran her fingers through his coarse inky black curls.

"Fuck me sideways," he whimpered. She kissed him all the way down his chest and down his stomach to the waist of his jeans. She unfastened the button so she press her lips to that even softer and smoother skin under his waist. He pressed his back to the door panel and relaxed. She caressed that soft skin there around his waist before she groped down his pants.

He bit his lip as she fondled him with both hands.

"Holy—HOLY FUCKIN CHRIST!" he sputtered through gritted teeth. He tilted his head back to show off the middle of his neck. She groped him as if she was playing with some fresh pizza dough. His chest heaved but his stomach still ached at him.

But it didn't matter because he knew he would come for her there.

There was a knock on the door behind him. They both froze in place.

"Hannah? Joey?"

"It's Francine," he whispered to her.

"Oh, good," she said as she tucked him back into his pants. "Had me worried there for a second."

"Guys, can you hurry up please?" Francine insisted.

"Okay, Frankie, we're coming out right now—"

Joey was still buttoning up his shirt as they stumbled out of the bathroom and into the stewardess' station there, and began back to their seats. He ran his fingers through his curls before he took his seat once again.

"Did you hear they like to tie people up?" Aunt Elka was saying to Scott.

"I did!" he proclaimed with a rich blush upon his face. Hannah took her seat next to Joey again and she was about to say something to him when she hesitated.

"What's the matter?" Joey asked her. She peered behind them to look at the crowns of her parents' heads: he craned his neck to make out the sight of the disgruntled expression on her mother's face and her father massaging his temples.

"I can't believe you forgot that, Marcus!" Jen snapped.

"I just forgot, okay?" He lifted his head to look at Hannah. "Honey, I'm sorry. I forgot some paperwork to make a big commission there in Tahoe City definite. I had them in my hand and I laid them there on the table for a second to pick up my keys."

She bowed her head and turned away so she sat in her seat in a proper position. Joey knitted his eyebrows together. She closed her eyes as Jen furiously said something to Marcus. She shook her head at the sound of it happening behind her.

Joey peered across the aisle at Frankie, who swallowed and then shrugged at him.

"I just," she breathed. Joey lingered right in her face; he never liked seeing her with such a wounded look on her face. He picked up her right hand and held the back up to his lips.

"What?" he coaxed her in a voice so soft he may as well have breathed it.

"I just want some peace and quiet," she whispered to him.

"A quiet place," he filled in as he kissed the back of her hand.

"I've never liked it when my parents got into an argument," she told him.

"You probably lost some money, though," he pointed out.

"It's alright, Francine or I can ask the person to do it again for me when we get there. It's no big deal, baby." She almost breathed the word "baby" at him. He held her hand the whole flight to Reno, even when they made a stopover in Kansas City. He made sure her parents couldn't see where he kept his hand, but he managed to hold her hand even when they touched down in Reno.


	9. as fresh as a blanket of fallen snow

"Welcome to Reno, gentlemen."

Marcus strode ahead of them as if he was in a hurry; he kept his things close to his body. Jen, who had spent the last seven hours bickering with him there on the plane behind Joey and Hannah, let out an exasperated sigh and shook her head as she strove to catch up with him. Hannah and Joey meanwhile kept their holding hands out of their sight as they followed them towards the front doors.

She lingered close to him and he pushed their hands behind his hip so it looked as though she was guiding him along the walkway. The Franks walked alongside them with their gazes pointed out the vast bay windows: out there beyond the Reno skyline stood the cold massive snow capped Sierra Nevada Mountains behind the earthy barren hills, crowned with the hazy golden glow of the afternoon sun. Joey knew it would snow again at some point that week, if not that night.

Hannah caught a glimpse of the starry-eyed look on Francine's face: she noticed she was looking on at the snowy white blocky twin buildings making up Harrah's and the glossy fiery red windows of the Hilton.

"If I didn't know better, I'd swear we were in Vegas," Frankie admitted.

"This place is beautiful, Hannah," Francine gawked.

"Not as beautiful as upstate New York, though," she retorted in a singsong voice. She turned her head to the left as Joey flashed her a wink.

"So what's your connection here?" asked Scott as he strode up to her right with his overnight bag resting on his back.

"I've spent the first seven summers and Thanksgivings of my life here, when I was in elementary school." She leaned in closer to his face. "Before Joey and I met."

"Oh, I see," he whispered back to her.

"So we're gonna head to Aunt Elka's house first," Jen was saying once they came within earshot; Joey tugged his and Hannah's hands behind the seat of his pants.

"Which means Ash and Graham are there?" Hannah asked her mother with a smile on her face; but then again, Joey wasn't sure if it came from her desire to reunite with her cousins or the fact she kept her hand a couple of inches away from his ass.

"They are!" Aunt Elka declared with a twinkle in her eye and a grin at Scott. He blushed at her as he followed the three of them out those big glass front doors of the airport to the cold, dry blast of high desert air and pale subdued sunlight. Joey shivered and huddled even closer to Hannah, who licked her lips and flexed her fingers.

Frankie shivered himself while Francine rubbed her upper arms.

"Damn, it's cold!" Scott exclaimed over the rush of wind and the noise from the freeway nearby.

"Different kinda cold from New York," Marcus called back to them as they crossed the pavement to the rental cars awaiting them. Joey hunched his shoulders and clasped a hand to his head to hold down his hair. His hair, usually coarse with its tight coils and curls, felt as though it quickly dried out even by walking outside for a few seconds.

Marcus, Jen, and Aunt Elka took to the little gray car closest to them while Hannah led the four of them to the little black one.

"So we're all gonna be crammed into this little thing here?" Francine teased her once they had lugged everything into the trunk.

"It won't be for very long, though," Hannah assured her as she unlocked the driver's side door; they were met with that fresh new car smell as they each slid into the comfortable warm interior there. Joey, Scott, and Frankie took to the back right there behind the girls.

"Won't be for very long?" Francine echoed again.

"Yeah, you three little birds in the back here don't have to wait very long," Hannah reassured them; Frankie shifted his weight there in the middle seat and raised his knees up. Joey leaned forward to the back of the seat to Hannah's mane of coarse dark hair, which he noticed began drying out with the cold desert.

"—I sure as holy fuck can't wait," he whispered into her ear.

"I'm sure you can't, baby," she retorted. "Don't be so fresh yet, though."

"I'm as fresh as a blanket of fallen snow," Joey teased her.

"Joey's been locked up in a stuffy plane for seven hours straight," said Frankie with a bit of a chuckle and a nod to his head.

"Yeah, he's been locked up for seven hours in front of two argumentative parents," Scott corrected him. "He hasn't been sitting next to a middle aged Scandinavian lady with a weird bondage fetish."

Joey and Frankie gaped at him.

"Yeah, Aunt Elka has a thing or two that'll shock you," Hannah told him with a glimpse into the rear view mirror before she adjusted it for her eyes. "Don't bring it up to Ash and Graham, though."

"Why's that?" asked Francine as she buckled herself in.

"I dunno, they just get kinda like—I wanna say 'ugh, Mom!' whenever it's brought up."

"The fact she brings it up at any whim is kinda throwing, though," Scott admitted.

"Well, that's her approach," Hannah pointed out. "She's from Norway, and Europeans are a little more open than us Yanks. So she—along with my dad—took her approach in raising them to feel comfortable with themselves."

Joey nibbled on his lip and the butterflies returned to his stomach at that. That would actually explain a lot now that he thought about it. But then again, it almost made no sense to hide it from her parents. He wondered if this weekend would be as interested as he figured.


	10. teddy grahams and ash wednesday

Hannah followed her parents into the cute little neighborhoods underneath the barren hills: the afternoon sun faded behind the soft haze and glimmered in and out of the trees overhead. Joey sighed through his nose as he peered out the window at the quaint little houses on either side of the street. It reminded him of one of the smaller towns in upstate New York, around Albany area.

Albany make him think back to September. He thought about telling Hannah about their shooting the video for one of the new songs on _Spreading the Disease_ , but then again he felt it better to keep it under wraps. It would be better to surprise her with it.

Joey glanced over at Scott and Frankie there in the back seat next to him: the both of them looked as though they had eaten something utterly rank. Hannah noticed this herself: she took one glimpse into the rear view mirror and raised her eyebrow at them.

“You guys alright back there? Scott, Frankie, you guys both look like you're about to puke.”

“I'm kinda car sick,” Scott confessed.

“And I'm sitting on something sharp,” added Frankie.

“Something sharp?” Francine echoed.

“Like a—like a—I dunno,” Joey rambled, “a needle?”

“Nah, not a needle. More like a fork.”

“Why would you be sittin' on a fork?” asked Scott.

“Same reason Joe would be laying on a butter knife,” Frankie blathered.

“A butter knife, not one of Hannah's canvases?” Joey teased him.

“Which one?” asked Francine with a grin on her face.

“The red one,” Frankie joked with her.

“Which red one, the ones upstairs or the one facing the ground?” Francine laughed.

“You tell me, Francine,” Joey said without missing a beat.

“Now, that'll be something saved for a rainy day,” Hannah pointed out.

“YES!” Joey pumped his fists as they reached the curb in front of a large black and white house surrounded by tall towering scraggly black cotton wood trees; in lieu of grass for the front lawn, there stood a series of rows of barren vines creeping over wires. Joey lifted his sunglasses for a better look at them through the car window. There was still a bit of sunshine around them, but the sun had for the most part dipped behind the cold summit of Mount Rose: thus he could make out the sight outside of Frankie's line of sight.

“Your aunt lives at a vineyard?” he asked Hannah.

“Kinda. She and my uncle Kane loved to garden together. You know, it's—kinda hard to grow things like tomatoes and chili peppers in a place as cold as Norway. When his Alzheimer's was getting bad, she let him get almost engrossed in growing. It was the only thing that brought him peace to—you know, otherwise losing his mind.”

Without another word, she unfastened her seat belt and climbed out of the car into the chilly, arid evening: Joey followed suit with his sunglasses tucked in his jacket pocket. The desert wind was sharp and merciless on his slim little body, so acquainted with upstate New York. Hannah looked as though she was about to put her arm around him to keep him warm but her parents and Aunt Elka climbed out of the car in front of them.

No dice.

The three adults led Scott and Frankie up the narrow gravel walkway to the front step; Joey and the girls lingered behind for a look around the yard.

Up ahead, Aunt Elka took out her keys and, even from bringing up the rear, Joey could hear someone shouting something on the inside of the house. He stuck his foot in a small pothole before the front step and almost lost his balance.

“Whoa, easy there, big fella,” Frankie caught him before he fell ass over teakettle onto the gravel. Joey took his foot out of the hole: pain shot up his lower leg from his ankle. He crouched down to massage his ankle but Hannah and Francine both almost ran right into him.

“Ow, fuck—” he muttered under his breath. “—fuck—God damn it.”

“Joey, watch your mouth,” Hannah scoffed at him.

“I almost broke my ankle there, though, Hannah babe,” he proclaimed as he almost lost his balance on the edge of the step.

“Watch your mouth, God damn it.” She may as well have yanked him up onto the front step by the tip of his nose. Flustered, he gathered himself and bowed next to Hannah there on the inside of the doorstep and into the spacious foyer, where they were greeted by a stairwell in freshly scrubbed, rich red carpet and two kids. The boy had a thick bushy head of dark hair with blond highlights while the girl had a short bob of mousy brown hair. They both had those high features, just like Aunt Elka. Both kids wore heavy dark woolly sweaters with diamond patterns around their chests; he held a small box of crackers in one hand.

“Joey, Francine, Frankie, Scott,” Hannah began, “this is my cousin Graham, and my cousin Ash. Elka's kids.”

“Hannah brought a party with her,” Marcus cracked from behind them, to which Hannah scoffed and playfully rolled her eyes at.

“We're gonna party down this weekend,” Graham teased with a glimmer of mischief in his eye.

“Do you guys need any help?” Ash offered in a mild, suave wave of a voice.

“Would love some help!” Frankie declared, rubbing his hands together. Graham popped a small piece of brown cracker into his mouth and offered Joey some.

“Oh, yes please—thank you.” He took a graham cracker for himself, and he was about to take a nibble of it when Frankie and Ash ducked past him and out of the house back to the car. Graham followed them outside.

“God, I am _freezing_!” Joey proclaimed with a shudder and a rub of his upper arms.

“Funny, I'd think upstate New York is kind of like upstate Nevada,” Hannah teased him as she hung her coat up on the hook.

“What makes you think that?” he asked, stunned.

“Well, if you think about it—both are cold, a little dreary, barren, untouched, stark, painfully underrated, quite indigenous, and are caught up in an endless loop of karma indebted to the city to the southern most tip of the state. The only difference is all of our natural water doesn't really go anywhere.”

Francine called Hannah into the next room, and she raised a finger at Joey, and she ducked out of the foyer into the kitchen. He turned to Scott, who watched Frankie, Ash, and Graham out there at the curb with a smirk on his face.

“What you smirkin' at?” asked Joey as he tugged the lapels of his jacket.

“Ash is cute,” Scott confessed; once the words left his lips, the smirk turned into one of slight disgust.

“God, Scott.” Joey could hardly speak.

“I know,” he muttered.

“I—”

“Yeah.”

“ _Scott_.”

“What?”

“Okay, it was one thing with Aunt Elka. But now cousin Ash?”

“I dunno, man. Ash looks closer to our age.”

“Hey, Joe! Scott!” Frankie called out, and that was their cue to help them out. It was one thing with Aunt Elka because she was the widow.

It was another thing entirely when he and Scott both found out the day after was Ash's eighteenth birthday.


	11. that first night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _“In dreams I can rule your life,  
>  with me nothing's ever right.  
> Sing for me up on a stage:  
> keep your mind trapped in a cage.”_  
> -”Now It’s Dark”, Anthrax (of course!)

Joey and Scott both found out they would be up at the cabin on Thanksgiving day, which meant the next two nights would be spent there at Aunt Elka's house. Graham showed the two of them and Frankie the spare guest room upstairs after the rather lovely dinner courtesy of Hannah and Jen. They were to be right next door to Graham and Ash's rooms, and across the hall from Aunt Elka. Hannah assured them the cabin up at the lake was larger and thus they would have their own rooms.

It was a narrow hallway that gave the three of them a wave of chills upon reaching the top landing of the stairs. Nothing covered the blank eggshell colored walls; there stood a small spindly table at the far end with a small glass vase that looked as though it been pieced and glued together.

It didn't help matters that Joey shivered from the cold winds outside.

Frankie peered about the dark carpet: not a speck of dirt to be found under the pale yellow light on the ceiling overhead. The hallway smelled clean, as if one of them had vacuumed before hand. Joey gazed all the way down to the end of the corridor, to the blank wall there, blank save for the framed picture of Kane there right in the middle of the panel. He thought back to when Hannah's art gallery was flooded by rain water back in New York City; even from the landing, he felt Kane was looking right through him.

Those eyes followed him through the pale light and into the cozy room with two twin beds and a dresser, the latter of which stood underneath a large bay window looking out to the dark hills and the even darker slopes of Mount Rose. Without wasting another minute, Joey set down his things and took out his dream catcher from his overnight bag; he spotted the head of a nail on the wall over the bed on the left, and he strung it up there. He wondered if Hannah brought hers along and if she had a spot on the wall in the living room to hang it up.

“Dream catcher's up, Frankie,” Scott said in a singsong voice.

“Dream catcher means dibs,” Frankie followed up with a snicker and a nod of the head; he had had a little too much wine at dinner. “Which means either of the two of us have to sleep on the floor.”

“Or we can sleep foot to toe,” Scott pointed out.

“Foot to toe?” Joey laughed at that.

“Head to toe, Scott,” Frankie corrected him with another giggle.

Once they were settled in, Joey was quick to close the door. He knew Hannah and Francine were downstairs in the living room, across from the other guest room which Jen and Marcus took for themselves. But his haste to shut the door took Scott and Frankie by surprise.

“What's up with you, Joe?” the latter asked him as he took off his shirt and let his lush black hair fall about his tailored shoulders and collar bones.

“Uncle Kane's spooking him,” Scott teased as he lay his head down in the same direction as the window.

“That picture at the end of the hallway was like one of those trick pictures,” Joey explained who tucked his shirt into the top drawer of the dresser. He flicked back his black curls and slipped under the covers of the bed on the left side of the room. He pulled the sheet, the two fleecy blankets, and the quilt over his slender body; the sharp arid cold was eating away at him. He snuggled down in the soft bed: the only thing to make this better was to have Hannah cuddled right next to him and holding him close to her.

Once Frankie lay down in the opposite direction from the window, Scott reached up to switch off the lamp. With the darkness outside, the room fell so pitch black, so black neither of them could see each other from the either side of the room.

“God forbid one of us has to get up to pee,” Frankie muttered. “Especially me.”

“Spooky dark,” Joey added; the sound of Graham and Ash's voices caught his ear on the other side of the wall behind his back.

“That dream catcher's gotta work somehow,” Scott whispered.

“When you're sleepin',” Joey pointed out as he rolled over onto his back. While the quilt covered his neck and part of his chin, part of the blankets underneath slid down his chest and revealed his dark nipples; on top of this it was dark, but he couldn't help but feel exposed a bit. The bed sheet hugged his slim body to where he almost felt delicate.

A delicate boy without his girl, his best friend.

Then again, Frankie was there without Francine. Some nonsense about the girls having to sleep downstairs or something like that, Joey wasn't paying full attention when things went down there. As his eyes adjusted to the rich darkness, he stared across the floor at Scott, whose thick eyebrows even stood out there. He actually resembled a cartoon character, even in the dark.

“You still awake, Joey?” Scott asked him.

“It's only been a minute so yeah.”

“I can't stop thinking about cousin Ash,” Scott confessed.

“Barely legal, Scott,” Frankie said with another snicker.

“Between her and Aunt Elka—” Joey was cut off by Ash's laughter on the other side of the wall. He heard her say something about a bottle. Spinning a bottle on the floor. Graham's voice caught his ear.

“You guys hear them on the other side of the wall here?” he asked them. They fell silent to hear what was going on the other side of the wall. Graham said something, and then Ash said something. And then there was a third voice.

“Try to hit me, dear—”

Ash said something.

“It's unclear—”

The three of them hung there in silence.

“Was that supposed to rhyme?” Joey muttered. “Try and hit me, dear. It's unclear. I just hit a deer. Hang on, lemme drink a beer—” Frankie chuckled at that, and it brought a soft laugh from Scott as well. Joey tugged the quilt up over his ears. It had been a long day with the flight and the swift change of travelling over three time zones. He gazed up into the darkness and for a second, he swore he saw something moving up there.

Too dark. He closed his eyes and relaxed.

Their voices still floated in through the wall: almost like a white noise to him. He shook his head in hopes of shaking the image of Kane staring into his soul. Frankie began breathing heavy and Scott yawned.

 _I need to relax_ , Joey told himself, _I need to... I need to…_

And without another though, he drifted off.


	12. singing to himself, part one

_November 26, 1986_.

Joey awoke at some point during the morning to what sounded like an elephant outside. He opened his eyes and peered about the pitch dark ceiling; not a sound anywhere. Scott and Frankie weren't even snoring in the bed next to him.

 _Just a dream_ , he thought to himself. And then he heard again: like an elephant stood outside the window there and huffed through its trunk.

He thought about uncle Kane staring into his soul from that picture at the end of the hallway. The last thing he wanted to think about.

Without moving his head up on the pillow, he peered up at the window over his head and only saw darkness. Frankie coughed and shifted his weight a bit in the other bed but he never awoke. Joey closed his eyes again and tried to go to sleep.

He thought about Hannah down there in the living room. He wondered if she was sleeping alright himself, and if Francine was, too.

Joey shook his head there on the pillow, such that a piece of ringlet stuck onto the side of his face; another ringlet fell over his brow. He shook his head again, this time to snap himself out of it.

 _What the hell am I doing_ , he thought to himself. _I'm at my girl's family's house. Chill out, Joe—you're fine, for fuck's sake_.

But the noise outside persisted. He opened his brown eyes and stared into the darkness. Settled into this house and this room, and never found the chance to clean himself off: indeed, the crown of his head itched.

What time is it…

Whatever that was outside became less of the sound of nightmares and more of an annoyance. He lay there for a moment before he sighed through his nose and sat up with the covers still over him. He reclined back on his hands and glanced over at Scott and Frankie's silhouettes underneath the blankets. Neither of them moved about, or made a sound, but even in the darkness, he could make out the shape of the latter's nose from underneath his plush black hair, now blacker than the darkness itself.

He heard the noise outside again; he swung his legs out from underneath the blankets and chills ran up his skin. Joey turned his head to see nothing but darkness.

Trying not to let it get to him, he stood up and headed over to his overnight bag to fetch his soap and bottle of nice soft smelling shampoo: he hoped Aunt Elka had clean towels on hand because he forgot his. His head spinning a bit from waking up so early, he made his way over to the door. He flung it open and was met with a bit of ambient glow from the lights in nearby Reno: still spooky dark but he could at least make out where he was going. He turned his head to the left, down where the picture of uncle Kane hung up on the wall.

 _It's just a picture_ , he assured himself. _It's just a fucking picture_.

Careful not to wake up Graham and Ash, Joey made his way towards the stair landing and kept going towards the bathroom. The carpet was cold underneath his bare feet, but he didn't mind. He had walked across many a number of cold carpets back home in New York.

Aunt Elka told him it was the first door on the left: he pushed it open and reached to his right to switch on the light.

He not only snapped his eyes shut but bowed his head at the sight of the golden yellow light from the lights above the vanity mirror. He blinked several times and stepped inside of the room.

There was a small clock behind the rim of the sink basin with a white face and brick red hands: ten to five in the morning.

He shrugged as he closed the door behind him. Lucky for him, a clean soft green towel and a matching wash cloth hung on the dowel next to the spacious shower. Perfect.

He peeled off his pajama bottoms and stepped inside of the shower. The water was warm and soft against the crown of his head and his smooth brown skin. Even though it was early, he was alone.

He thought back to when he played in the band prior to Anthrax, Bible Black, and when he faced off that kid Ben in Seattle with the name under his belt. He wasn't a bad kid, just made bad choices.

But there was that one song that he had been meaning to share with Hannah when he found the chance, “Midnight Dancer”. As he ran his fingers through his drenched, soapy curls, he remembered how he and Frankie were midnight dancers themselves that night in Seattle. Walking the streets alone, dancing the night away under the lights of the Pacific Northwest.

“Dance the night away—” His sleep riddled voice echoed through the shower walls. He still remembered the words and thus began singing it right then and there.

Trying not to wake anyone, he sang that song as well as “Blackbird”, the song he sang to her when they still hung out at the quiet place and he was learning how to sing.

His inky black curls sprawled over his collar bones and his slim shoulder blades like the tentacles of an octopus; he took a look down at his toned thighs, the thickest part of his slim svelte body, before he took one last rinse of the warm water. He switched off the faucet and reached for the towel on the rung.

He ruffled it over his hair and then down his arms and his body before he wrapped it around his waist.

The vanity mirror fogged up quite a bit; he reached out to smear off the condensation and gazed on at the handsome brown eyed boy staring back at him, with his dark lips parted just a bit and a droplet of water resting on the straight bridge of his Roman nose.

He knitted his dark eyebrows together and nibbled on his bottom lip, and then took a step back as the condensation dissipated a bit. He poked out his bare chest a bit and held onto the towel there at his waist. He flexed his arm muscles as if trying to show off, even though there was no one to show off to.

Without another word, he put his pajama bottoms back on and gave his hair another ruffle with the towel.

As he stepped out of the bathroom, that hearty aroma of fresh coffee caught his attention. Granted, he was shirtless but he still ambled down the stairs and into the kitchen downstairs.

Jen stood before the counter wrapped in a pale blue silk bathrobe and little salmon colored slippers. She turned her head to find Joey striding into the room with nothing more than the towel wrapped around his upper body like Aunt Elka's shawl.

She grinned at him.

“Where is your shirt?” she demanded as she turned towards him and folded her arms across her chest. She eyed his slim bare waist.

“—in hiding,” he sputtered; chills ran up his arms from the cool linoleum underneath his bare feet. She chuckled at him and shook her head. The sound of soft snoring caught his ear: he gazed ahead to the dark living room, where Hannah and Francine were still asleep in.

“Care for a bit of toast?” she offered as two pieces of sourdough toast shot up from the cute red toaster behind her.

“Sure, why not.” He shrugged and padded over to the bar for a seat on the stool there. Jen reached for a clean small white china plate in the cupboard behind her and set the large pieces of toast on the basin. She spread a knob of butter and some blackberry jelly on each one before handing it to him with a warm smile good morning.

Joey didn't realize how hungry he was when he reached for the slice closest to him. He let the towel drape over his bare shoulders as he took that first bite.

“You do have a nice voice,” Jen remarked. Joey paused right there with his mouth full of sourdough toast and butter.

“How—” he began in a muffled voice. “—how'd you find that out?”

“I heard the shower running and I went to see who it was—and I heard you singing. Almost like a choir boy.”

“I am a tenor,” he reminded her, still with his mouth full.

“Mr. Tenor—you still gonna sing for us when we go up to the cabin tomorrow?”

He swallowed the bite.

“Of course. I might sing Hannah and Francine good morning here if you'd like. By the way, that coffee smells really good…”


	13. singing to himself, part two

“The thing that woke me up, by the way,” Joey began with a sip of coffee, “was the weirdest noise outside.”

“What was that?” asked Jen with a knitting of her eyebrows.

“It sounded like an elephant making a huffing noise. You know that short little—” He fluttered his lips. “—like that.”

“Oh, that was a deer,” she replied.

“That was a deer?” He raised his eyebrows at that.

“When Kane was still alive, he and Elka went outside to investigate it one time. He shone a flash light out to the trees and they saw a male deer out there with—kind of an aroused look in its eye.”

“So I was hearing a horny deer, is what you're saying.” Joey couldn't help but smirk at that.

“Yeah, pretty much.” Jen never changed her expression at the mischievous look in his eye. “I'm sure, living out by—where do you live again?”

“Oswego.”

“Ah, good old Oswego! Even though we're an hour away, there are moments where I miss it. I miss living so close to Syracuse.”

“Well, Rochester is Rochester. Can't go wrong with that.”

“No, you can't. But we know how bizarre upstate New York can get sometimes—it's just out here, I don't know what it is. Marc thinks it's the effect of the desert and the Shoshone and Paiute tribes being so close.” She leaned back against the edge of the counter and sipped her coffee. She held the mug before her face and scanned Joey with a bit of intent.

“Hannah told me you're Native American yourself. You look it, too. Like I can see it in your eyes and your face—and I can just feel it.”

“Iroquois. On my mom's side.”

“Thought so. Mother knows best, especially with the primordial rhythm involved.”

“And you're Blackfoot.”

“Two tribes with the strength of diamonds,” she remarked. “We fought the Sioux nation. You guys fought the English.”

“Then again, who hasn't?” he retorted with a slight shrug of the shoulders.

She laughed at that and took another sip before she spoke again.

“So—I don't mean to intrude, so if you don't mind telling me, that is, but—how did you and Hannah meet each other? Just out of curiosity.”

Joey swallowed and his stomach turned a bit. This was a question he had feared but never gave much consideration to, because he assumed Hannah had control over it and they would form a story together.

“She's a great artist,” he started with a bit of reluctance, “I was drawn to her craft—just by seeing her there back home in upstate New York. I couldn't stop frequenting her, like I kept coming back to her. I felt connected to her heart, and her mind, and everything that makes her her. One thing led to another and the next thing I know, I'm calling her my friend.”

“Totally natural like that.”

“Totally natural. I thought she kinda looked like me, too—it's not often I come across a girl with long dark wavy hair and big brown eyes to equal my own.”

“So have you ever thought of—?” She showed him a little lopsided smile.

“What?”

“Getting a little closer to her?”

“Oh, no. No, no, no. I like her but—not of that level, though.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

She squinted her eyes at him. Joey nibbled on his bottom lip and held his mug close to him.

“When we were in the airport, I saw her rubbing your butt,” she said. He shifted his weight right there.

“She was trying to get me to move,” he quipped.

“I see.”

“It was a—a, uh, long flight.”

“Hence the shower at an ungodly hour.”

“Hence the shower of power at an ungodly hour,” he retorted with a wag of his finger, and she laughed again.

“I heard you singing 'Blackbird',” she recalled, and the smile returned over his face. “Do you mind at all?”

He turned his head to the dark shadow still lingering over the living room. Hannah and Francine were still out like lights; he returned to Jen and cleared his throat. He hadn't had a drink of water but the cup of coffee before him would have to do.

“ _Blackbird singing in the dead of night_ ,” he crooned in a gentle voice, gentle not to awake the girls or anyone else in the whole house, “ _take these broken wings and learn to fly. All your life… you were only waiting for this moment to arise_.”

She nodded her head as if giving her approval.

“ _Blackbird singing in the dead of night… take these sunken eyes and learn to see. All your life… you were only waiting for this moment to be free_.”

She smiled at him as he took another sip of coffee.

“You are as good as you are handsome.” And he nearly spat out his swig at the sound of that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyrics to Blackbird, of course 💜


	14. singing to himself, part three

Within time, the sun rose over the desert hills in the east, which bestowed light upon the sight of Joey sitting there at the counter with his hair still wet from his shower. He turned to find Hannah had awoken before Francine: she smiled at him from their little space of a slumber party there on the living room floor. Her face was accentuated by the streams of fresh orange sunlight filtering through the curtains to her left.

He thought about the glass orbs in her gallery back in Rochester, and the others in the gallery up in Seattle. All the colors of the rainbow bathing over their faces like washes of paint over their skin. He wondered about the paintings she made back in the City, and if Jen, Marcus, and Aunt Elka had seen them at all.

Joey let his eyes wander over to the black leather bound book on the coffee table, which they had moved up against the foot of the hearth of the fireplace. He thought back to when they believed Francine was cheating on Frankie, and he wondered what was even inside of that journal.

Voices floated down the stairs in front of him, and then he remembered.

Today was cousin Ash's birthday! He looked down at his slim waist underneath the towel and he thought about putting a shirt on as he finished his second cup of coffee.

Jen left the room to check to see if Marcus was awake, which meant Joey climbed off of his seat and made his way over to the sink to rinse out his mug.

He had switched off the water when he felt a slight pinching on his hips.

He glanced down to find her fingers snaking around his bare waist and towards the button of his pajama bottoms.

“'Mornin', baby doll,” he told her in a low voice as he set the mug in the drainer to his left.

“So soft,” Hannah remarked as she gave his toned stomach a gentle pat.

“I try my best,” he confessed as he turned to face her and the big beaming smile on her face. He gave his ringlets another ruffle with the towel and then draped it once again over his shoulders.

“And sexy,” she added with a scan of the sprigs of dark hair his chest, and his stomach, and the waist of his pajama bottoms.

“Again, I try my best. So we're going up to the lake—tomorrow is it?”

“Yeah. I'm so glad you guys all could come along, too.”

“We still doin' Christmas back at my parents' place?”

“Of course! We'll have some fun here, too, if you know what I mean.” She flashed him a wink.

“Hey, if we gotta find a closet or a place in the snow, I'm down with it,” he assured her. Voices floated in from the hallway behind them.

“Party's gonna pick up again,” she assured him in a whisper; he recognized Scott's voice and the way it carried down the stairs. He heard Aunt Elka's voice in junction with it.

“I gotta put a shirt on, anyways. Can't be walkin' around with my tits and my tummy—hangin' out—” He ran his hands over his dark nipples much to Hannah's amusement.

Once Elka's voice came closer, he spread the towel over his chest and darted out from behind her to the living room. He was stuck: there was no way he'd get up to the upstairs bedroom again without passing Elka without his shirt on.

Francine was still asleep which gave him time to rummage through Hannah's overnight bag. She wore his hockey jersey back at his parents' house: surely she should have something for him to wear himself. She was bigger and heavier than him: something of hers had to fit him.

Indeed, he found her stretchy sweatshirt with black and blue stripes and put it on over his body. Granted, it was stretchy and the sleeves hugged his lanky arms but the bottom gently hugged his waist: in fact, he took a glance down to find he still had a few inches of clearance between the bottom of the shirt and the top of his pajama bottoms.

Aunt Elka, Scott, and Hannah's voices carried out into the next room, which gave him the chance to run upstairs to hang up the towel and find a better shirt.

He took another glimpse into the mirror before him, at his slender beautiful body and that sliver of dark skin peeking out at him.

It reminded him of the day he auditioned for Anthrax, and he wore those painted on tight jeans with that leopard print shirt he nicked from his aunt's closet. He ran his fingers through his still wet black curls and smiled at his own reflection.

“’Should'a been go-one—’” he whispered to himself, and he thought about singing it to Hannah when they reached the lake within a day's time. His fingertips rested on his bare skin in hopes of imitating Hannah’s touch there from earlier.

He knew it was going to be a while before he could find the chance to touch her and feel her again, but he knew he would relish every second of it.


	15. singing to himself, part four

By the time Joey had found a better shirt to change into as well as his jeans, Scott had awoken for a fresh new day and put on a clean shirt and was brushing his hair, but Frankie was still asleep. He raised his dense eyebrows at the sight of Joey wearing his girl's shirt and chuckled to himself.

“What?” Joey demanded as he stripped off the striped shirt and stood there with his inky curls streaking down his bare back and over his collar bones.

“Do I have to ask?” Scott asked in a low voice.

“It's—It's a long story.” Joey picked up the plain white sweatshirt from his overnight bag.

“C'mon, it can't be that bad.”

Joey let out a short, terse sigh.

“I took a shower and as I got out, I smelled coffee, and I went downstairs, and there was Jen. She and I talked until the sun came up, and then I heard your voice with Elka's voice, and I didn't want her to see me without a shirt on. So when no one was looking, I vouched for Hannah's luggage and got out this little sweatshirt here. It fits me like that little animal print shirt I wore to my audition.”

Scott chuckled again as he ran the hairbrush through the hair on the side of his head. Frankie still hadn't moved from his spot there at the foot of the bed. A piece of his lush black hair had strewn down on part of his face and onto the bridge of his nose. His hand rested on the top of the pillow right before his face.

Scott tapped on Joey's shoulder before he could put on his shirt.

“What?”

Scott nodded over in Frankie's direction. Joey knitted his eyebrows at him.

“What?”

“You thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?” Scott asked him in a hushed voice. He shook his head.

“No.”

“Look where his hand is. You really not thinkin' what I'm thinkin'?”

“…no.”

“We should find like a pot or somethin' and fill it with water.”

And then Joey realized what he was talking about.

“If you use one of Aunt Elka's pots, I'm telling.”

Blush crossed over Scott's face.

“You wouldn't—”

“Yes, I would.” Joey tugged the shirt over his head and his delicate body. He put his hands under his curls to take them out from underneath his collar and raised his eyebrows at Scott.

“Well, I wanna do somethin', though,” he insisted. Joey folded his arms over his chest and nibbled on his bottom lip. He peered about the room for something, and then he spotted a felt tipped pen on the nightstand.

“I got an idea,” he told Scott and lunged for the pen.

Careful not to wake him, Joey brushed the out of Frankie's face. Once he had a blank space to work from, he screwed off the cap of the pen and held it over Frankie's face. He was out like a light, which allowed Scott to giggle to himself the whole entire time and for Joey to do some more singing to himself.

“ _The sky is red, I don't understand_ ,” he whispered with each stout, steady pen stroke, “ _past midnight I still see the land… People are sayin' the woman is damned, she makes you burn with a wave of her hand…_ ”

Scott clasped his hands over his mouth by the time Joey capped the pen. He stood to his feet and congregated next to Scott at the bedroom door.

“How you did that with a straight face is beyond me,” he remarked, to which Joey shrugged.

“I have my ways.”

He turned his head right as Graham and Aunt Elka padded down the hall together: she cradled a ceramic bowl with two small accompanying wooden spoons in her hands, and inside Scott and Joey could see a thick off white paste.

“Oh, there they are,” he declared. “You guys know it's my sister's birthday, right?”

“But of course!” Scott assured him, and Joey wondered what sort of ace up his sleeve he had with him.

“Jen and I are making her a cake together,” Aunt Elka continued, “a traditional Norwegian cream cake, and I want to see what the two of you think of it.”

She scooped a bit of the smooth batter with the one spoon and handed it to Scott. He took it for a lick and closed his eyes.

“Oh—Oh, so smooth. Joey have a taste.”

Aunt Elka handed Joey a spoon for himself: indeed, the batter was smooth and creamy, and almost earthy in taste. It was as if she added a very minimal amount of sugar to the mix.

“If I could eat this every night, I would,” he assured her.

“Then you wouldn't be so thin and easy on the eye,” Aunt Elka pointed out with a sly grin on her face, to which Joey could feel his face growing warm. Scott showed him a devilish smirk.

Behind them, Frankie groaned and sat up in the bed. The four of them turned for a look back at him, and Graham and Scott burst out laughing. Aunt Elka cupped a hand to her mouth to stifle a laugh. Joey couldn't help but chuckle at the outline of a Day of the Dead mask he had made on that one side of Frankie's face, complete with the slight shading around his eye and the bridge of his nose and the dots lining along the shape of his face.

Disoriented, and slightly baffled, Frankie blinked several times and ran his fingers through his lush hair.

“What's goin' on? So many smells of food I can't keep track.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyrics to Burn by Deep Purple!


	16. in the dark

It was another long night there for Joey at Aunt Elka's house, especially with the arrival of cold rain from the north. To cuddle with Hannah under the covers while the rain is falling on the roof overhead. At least this time around, Joey, Scott, and Frankie trekked up to the second floor with a hurricane lantern so the cold feeling there at the end of the hallway subsided somewhat.

But even as Joey lay down in the bed again under the window, he couldn't help but feel drawn to the rains overhead. Even as Scott and Frankie took back to their places there on the opposite bed, and they joked about something or other, it was that wall of white noise that let him fall asleep at such haste.

He was awoken, however, by the sound of Graham and Ash giggling and chattering about something in the next room over. There was no clock there in the bedroom but he knew it was early once he opened his eyes and gazed up at the ceiling.

Joey sighed through his nose, and rolled over in bed, and tried to fall back to sleep. He was about to fall back asleep when he felt something brush against his ankle.

He jerked himself awake to find a silhouette standing there at the foot of the bed. He scrambled back towards the wall and gasped at the sight of it.

“Joey? Are you awake?”

He rubbed his eyes as she inched closer to his face.

“What are you doing up?” he whispered to her.

“I couldn't sleep,” Hannah confessed as she took a seat there on the edge of the bed. “Francine kept kicking me in the face. I also just kept thinking about you, like how much I wanted to be closer to you. I brought you a drink of water.”

Joey took his hands out from underneath the covers to touch the glass. He held onto it with one hand and propped himself upright against the wall. He took a sip of that cool crisp water: it felt as though he had drank anything for days on end.

“Also, right before we went to sleep, Mom asked me about Ben,” she told him.

“Oh, yeah?” Even though it was dark, Joey raised an eyebrow at her and held the glass before his lips.

“She asked me if he and I ever got serious, and I told her no.”

He nibbled on his bottom lip at the thought of him.

“That's part of why I kept thinking about you,” she added. “My guy stood up for me and got to the bottom of it for me.”

“Well, we're best friends,” he pointed out; all the while he kept his voice low so as to not wake Scott and Frankie. “I like you. I'm obsessed with you. I'll stand up for you even if it gets me into a heap of trouble.”

In the dim light, he could see her crawling towards him like a kitten. He could feel her hands rest on the top of the quilt, on either side of his hips.

“Ben's not a bad guy—he's just a guy who, for whatever reason, acts like he's the bad shit,” he told her. She pressed her lips onto his to silence him. He held the glass off to the side so he wouldn't spill on the quilt, or on her.

She kissed him again, this time pushing him down onto his back. He reached down to set the glass down on the floor.

Hannah crawled onto his chest so she was laying on top of him there in the bed. She breathed harder with each kiss on his dark lips.

“Fuck, I needed this—” Joey breathed in between kisses.

“Me, too, baby,” she breathed back at him.

“Keep quiet, though.” In the dim light, he knew she could see him gesturing over to Scott and Frankie.

“Let them hear us,” she whispered to him.

“Oh—Oh, my girl—here—” He patted on the space of the bed next to him. “—here, get under the blankets so I can feel you better.”

She slid off of his chest and slipped under the blankets. She cuddled right up next to him. He put his arm around her and rested his hand on the small of her back: she only wore her pajama shirt. He let his fingers crawl underneath the waist band of her panties so to feel that soft flesh on her hip.

“I'm so glad you don't bar grudges like him,” she whispered into his face, to which he shrugged.

“There's no point,” he admitted. “I'd rather let him wither and be a sour fuck the rest of his life than get my ass involved.”

Hannah sighed through her nose and nestled even closer to his slender body.

“I'm so glad we're here,” she confessed to him, and she pressed her lips to the side of his neck.

“Mmm—that's good,” he confessed to her in a breath and a whisper. She never took her lips off of his neck as she made her way down to his collar bones.

“Yeah—yeah, right there,” he begged her. She pressed her finger to his lips to silence him.

“Quiet, baby,” she whispered into his ear. He still held her close to him as she gritted her teeth on the spot right under his collar bone. He could feel her nibbling on his skin.

Joey gritted his teeth to keep himself quiet even with that little sharp point of pain on his skin. Hannah touched the tip of her tongue onto the spot to ease the pain, but then she nibbled on him again.

“Fuck—” he blurted out, still in a hushed voice.

“Shhhh—”

Joey groaned in his throat from the pain. It hurt but it felt so good. Cathartic. A little love bite right there on his skin, right on the spot where it would be just out of sight from onlooking eyes. The only thing to make it even sexier was if she did it on his stomach, right under his belly button or near his hip bone.

The very thought of that made him squirm and feel that firmness between his thighs. He parted his lips to let out a quiet but definite whimper.

She licked him again, and followed it up with another nibble, and then another lick, and then another nibble. He breathed harder from the feeling but he still managed to stay quiet with her direction.

“I can't—” he blathered in a breathy voice. “I can't—I can't—I can't—”

“Okay, baby,” she assured him and gave the spot several sweet little kisses. Joey let out a low whistle as the pain welled right there under the bone. But the caress of her lips helped soothe the sensation. She bowed her head for a few kisses on his bare chest, and then she lay her head right over his heart to hear his rhythm.

“Why you always wanna hurt me,” he breathed out to her.

“Because I know how to take it away,” she told him. Frankie let out a noise that sounded as though he had swallowed a piece of popcorn the wrong way, which he followed up with a cough. Meanwhile, the noises next door had subsided into silence.

Joey relaxed with Hannah laying on his chest. That little spot of pain still nagged at him even as he fell asleep.


	17. the lake shore

The spot where Hannah had nibbled on Joey's skin still ached and even itched, even when he put some soap on it prior to their leaving the house for Lake Tahoe, and it didn't help matters that Aunt Elka insisted on the three of them wearing these heavy knit Christmas sweaters on the trip up to the lake. The sweaters she had given to both him and Scott were bright red and white and with little poinsettia flowers all around them; the good news was Joey could use the collar of the sweater to hide the hickey she had left on him.

And yet, on the ride up, on that four lane freeway winding throughout the vast narrow canyon which grew more and more alpine with every mile, he had a real hankering for a meatball sandwich that Marcus had promised to him, Scott, and Frankie when they stopped in Truckee. He also had a real hankering for Hannah herself.

More of those teeth on his skin. More of those soft touches on his skin.

 _Sometimes all ya need is a little cuddling_ , he thought to himself. _Snuggling up underneath those covers and feeling her warmth away from the world_ …

The road is lonely. The arts are lonely. Upstate New York is lonely.

The road turns redundant while the arts take place in isolation and in a cryptic state of mind while upstate resembles the end of the world in a way.

Even being in the next car with Marcus and Aunt Elka, and even though he knew Hannah was in the car behind them with Jen, Francine, Graham, and Ash, she felt so far away. It was a risk he would have to take, especially when Marcus asked the three of them what rooms they would be taking once they arrived at the cabin.

“There's three levels—I think there's just one room at the top floor, if I recall correctly. Hannah might know about it better so ask her.”

“I'll take the top floor,” Joey offered at a drop of a hat.

“Yeah, you just wanna be alone here,” Scott teased him.

“I'm older, I should take the top floor,” he pointed out. Aunt Elka chuckled at them but Joey was serious. If there was in fact one room at the top floor, then perhaps he and Hannah could have some time to themselves once the dust had settled for the night. He knew it was Thanksgiving but there was no denying it. He peered over at Frankie on the right side of the car and his gazing out to the rising cliffs all around them; Joey gazed out the window behind Aunt Elka's head at the sight of the pine trees and the ever increasing dusting of snow upon their branches.

As they neared the top of the pass, and beheld the sight of large trucks pulled over on the side of the road so as to put on chains, the trees drooped with snow and Joey wondered if his little black leather boots would be enough to walk about in the snow there outside of the cabin. The clouds loomed over their heads as they approached closer and closer to the lake shore and the area with the cabins.

They were about a mile from the lake shore, or at least according to Marcus. The neighborhood itself sprawled over about a mile of gentle hillside complete with those droopy evergreen pines and piles of plowed snow. Hannah had gotten them a three story cabin with a view of the last hillside before the waters: Joey spotted a clear wide pathway up the side of the hill, a single clear column of pure white snow in between the pieces of forest on the side of the hill there across the way from the cabin.

“Skiing,” Frankie noted once they had climbed out of the car and he spotted the hillside for himself.

“Yeah,” Joey showed him a little grin. “Or sledding, whichever we wanna do.”

“We'd haveta use a mattress to sled, though, Joe,” Scott pointed out.

“A mattress, that sounds like a college student stunt,” Marcus laughed at that. Scott offered to help Aunt Elka into the cabin while Frankie linked arms with Francine and Graham and Ash seemed more interested in building a snowman before the big front bay window of the cabin.

“Quite the place you got here, Xtina,” Joey teased Hannah as he helped her into the front foyer of the cabin. She rolled her eyes and set her hand on his upper back as if that would silence him. But it only made him want her more.

Once Jen, Marcus, Aunt Elka, and Scott had filed into the spacious kitchen on the left side of the front hallway there, he turned to Hannah with a smirk on his face. But then she pressed a finger to his lips.

“Don't even think about it,” she whispered into his face.

“Think about what?” he quipped.

“I know exactly what you're thinking.”

“What am I thinking?”

She hesitated so as to gaze right into Joey's big brown eyes and the little twinkle within there. She nibbled on her bottom lip and tugged him further away from the kitchen, and behind the doorway into the large but warm living room so they were out of earshot. She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and stared hard and deep into his eyes.

“Joey—we're with my parents. We can't be fooling around here when they're like ten away from us.”

“Yeah, but we were foolin' around at my parents' house, though,” he insisted. “We got away with that.”

“Yeah, but it was just your parents, though,” she pointed out. “It wasn't like your whole family was there.” She pressed her hands to her hips.

“Which room did you claim here?”

“Why do you wanna know that?”

“Tell me, Joseph.”

He parted his lips a bit but no sound emerged. The stern expression upon her face left him wondering.

“The—third floor. The room that's by its lonesome.”

“Why?” she stammered.

“'Cause—I'm older?”

“Joey, you do that for bunk beds, not bedrooms,” she spat.

She peered over her shoulder to ensure they were alone.

“You know what? I think you only took the upstairs bedroom just so we could fool around.”

“No, no, no, no,” he sputtered. “What are you saying, I can't touch my girlfriend when we have a moment together?”

“Shhhh,” she hissed as she brought a finger to his lips. “That's not what I'm saying at all.”

“Then why are you acting like this, though?” he demanded. “Why are you fighting with me on this?”

“Can I visit my family?”

“Of course. Of course, of course, of course, Hannah, babe. We wouldn't be here otherwise. But there's something about being in this setting and being apart from you in that house down the mountain that makes me wish we were together more. Especially given how it is outside right now.”

“Joey, listen to me,” she said in a curt tone and with her hands on his shoulders, “I need some time to myself. I need time with my parents and my relatives. I make art, I hang out with you, I make art, I hang out with you… I need some time with the Ellsberg side of life.”

Joey swallowed but he never flinched at that.

“Besides, the only time I ever get a thought to myself anymore is when I'm biting you,” she continued, “I'm starting to associate thoughts with the feeling of teeth on skin.”

He couldn't help but chuckle at that.

“That's a good one, I gotta write it down and show it ta Scott.”

“Yeah, and it'll be the best thing to be written down and put in an Anthrax song, too,” she scoffed. “But—I need a few hours to myself. Can I get a few hours, please?”

Joey sighed and bowed his head. And then Hannah put her arms around his slender body and kissed the tip of his nose.

“It's absolutely nothing against you—I just need to visit for a little bit.”

She kissed the tip of his nose again and then his lips before she stepped away. Joey was alone there in the living room: he stared across the floor to the large window on the other side of the room to which he could make sight of the ski slope and the fine sliver of cold gray waters, that little sliver of Lake Tahoe, and he hoped they would head down to the lake shore soon enough.


End file.
